It’s great to see new blood joining our fantastic sport of diving. I often hear people complaining about the lack of young people taking up our sport.

I hope I have done my bit by encouraging my son Jake to start diving. He completed a PADI open water course in Mallorca last summer. He was very well instructed at the Octopus Dive Centre in Port de Soller.

Enjoying warm water around Mallorca

He wanted to carry on and advance his diving which he is also able to incorporate into the Duke of Edinburgh award scheme. For the past few weeks he has been attending lectures and pool sessions with my club Clifton SAC . This is part of his cross-over into the BSAC system where he is now working towards his Sports Diver qualification.

This obviously means UK diving in a drysuit, I picked his pre-used O’Three up last week and this weekend we ventured out to Cromhall Quarry to get weights sorted out and have a first dry dive. While a great success I think he will need a couple more practice sessions before heading to the coast.

First Drysuit dive, we all started once!

The 2017 dive season is well underway with some fantastic conditions all around the UK coast. I can’t wait to show Jake the amazing underwater scenery, wildlife and heritage that remains around our shores.

BTW – Part 2 of the wreck id article is coming soon!